UENL formed an official Stichting (Foundation) in August 2018. In doing so, UENL is required to comply with a variety of financial regulations. Even more, looking ahead, we are planning to apply for the status as an Algemeen Nut Beogende Instelling (ANBI, i.e., Public Benefit Organization).

To ensure full financial compliance, as well as to receive the necessary guidance for our ANBI application, we are happy to announce that we have hired Andersen Tax & Legal. Over the past few weeks, this group (in particular, Hans de Vries) has provided us helpful insights with respect to the #30Rule legislation as well as our own internal finances. We feel confident with this organization and look forward to working with Andersen in the months ahead.

A rapidly changing world doesn’t ask for beaten paths. It needs creativity and intuition. Thinking out of the box. Extending boundaries. Having the guts to strike new paths and aim to be the benchmark for quality in our industry. - Andersen Tax & Legal

In September 2018, the Government announced its plans to reduce the #30Rule to a five-year term limit for current and new users of the #30Rule. The decision to break a deal with current users of the #30Rule was met with significant resistance by corporations, unions, lobbyists, and of course, the UENL community. Of particular note, UENL released a commissioned legal document which showed that the proposal violated Dutch law.

In October 2018, based on this resistance, the commissioned legal document, and a decision to maintain the dividend tax, the Government announced it would include SOME transition for SOME users of the #30Rule in the Belastingplan2019.

UENL, however, believes that #aDEALisaDEAL for EVERYONE – and to that end – UENL continued its efforts after October 2018 by requesting that existing term limits be respected for ALL current users of the #30Rule. UENL commissioned a second legal document which again showed that the proposal continues to violate Dutch law – specifically violating the principles of legal certainty, proportionality, and equality. In short, the #30Rule proposal – as included in the Belastingplan2019 – is counter to good governance.

With this information in hand, UENL continued its extensive lobbying efforts – ensuring that the Tweede Kamer was aware that treating current recipients of the #30Rule differently is damaging to the trustworthiness of the government and violates Dutch law. Ultimately, two different amendments were proposed by the opposition (GroenLinks & Socialist Party; PvdA & SGP) which respected term limits for ALL current users. The Tweede Kamer, however, rejected these amendments. The Tweede Kamer did vote to approve the revised Belastingplan2019.

UENL continues to believe that #aDEALisADEAL for everyone, As such, UENL will be taking two key steps in the coming weeks:

1. Lobbying the Eerste Kamer. Formally, the role of the Eerste Kamer is to scrutinize the actions of the Government. The Eerste Kamer can only reject or accept legislation. They cannot propose amendments. They do, however, have several other options to influence change. Like the Tweede Kamer, members of the Eerste Kamer are entitled to put written questions to the Government. They also debate on the Government's budget which gives them the opportunity to debate current and future policy. At UENL, we will be ensuring our voices are heard by the Eerste Kamer – including ensuring that our commissioned legal document is in the hands of the Eerste Kamer. Our main focus will be to reiterate that the #30Rule legislation in the Belastingplan2019 violates Dutch law. Although UENL will do its utmost, it is important to be realistic that the chances of successfully lobbying the Eerste Kamer are minimal.

2. Evaluating our Legal Options. Given that our chances of successfully lobbying the Eerste Kamer are minimal, we believe it is also important to fully understand our legal options. We are currently evaluating all options to determine whether legal action in court is a reasonable next step. In the coming days, we will continue our ongoing conversations with our legal team as well as with legal advisors to identify what is the most feasible and realistic solution. We will then present our plan to our Community, along with the associated costs.

The revised 2019 Belastingplan has been released. The proposal, as written now, confirms our earlier expectations. Less than half of all #30Rule recipients are proposed to receive transition.

According to the proposal: #30Rule recipients whose term began in 2016 or later will not receive a transition period (and thus will lose three years of their promised term). Individuals whose start date began before 2016 will maintain their #30Rule until a maximum of 31 December 2020.

UENL is currently working with our legal advisors and legal firms to understand the legal ramifications of this proposal and potential next steps. Parliamentary debates will begin on 5 November, providing us an opportunity to convince Parliament to amend the proposal so that term limits are respected for all current recipients of the #30Rule.

We recommend that affected individuals speak with their own tax advisors or with the Belastingdienst to understand their personal situations.

UENL Stichting hired the law firm Stibbe (Tom Barkhuysen) to investigate whether the Government can legally implement the proposed changes to the 30% rule without transitional measures. The resulting Legal Document, which was submitted to the Finance Committee, concludes that the proposal is contrary to the principles of legal certainty, predictability, and proportionality. Even more, the lack of transition measures is in direct conflict with the Staatssecretaris’s own published policy on transitional law in tax legislation and with the principles of due diligence and justification. As such, the proposal is unlikely to meet judicial scrutiny should it go into law and, therefore, the 2019 Tax Plan should be amended accordingly. The document was produced in Dutch, with an English translation also available.

Questions about the #30Rule and Dividend Tax? This is what we know, and don’t know.

UENL has confirmed that the dividend tax was submitted as a separate law proposal on Prinsjedag, September 18th, 2018. The dividend tax is part of the “Wet Bronbelasting 2020” proposal while the #30Rule is part of the “Belastingplan 2019” proposal.

Last week, we were informed that Parliament will vote upon these proposals separately on November 15th, 2018. We also heard the news of the reconsideration of all proposals by the government in regards to creating a better business climate – which includes the dividend tax and possibly the #30Rule.

What are the consequences for us? To be honest, we don’t know. We are not political analysts, however, we have been told that there are both positive and negative effects to this reconsideration – and as such, our optimism should remain tempered.

In the weeks ahead, we will continue our efforts to encourage Parliament to include an amendment to the #30Rule so that a transition period is included. We hope that the legal opinion assists in these efforts.